Bible Study Salvation: Much More Than Just "Fire Insurance."

[Tenchi]

Colossians 3:1-4
1 If then you have been raised
with Christ, seek the things
that are above, where Christ is,
seated at the right hand of God.
2 Set your minds on things that are
above, not on things that are on earth.
3 For you have died, and your
life is hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ who is your life appears,
then you also will appear with him in glory.
​

Often, I've encountered professing believers, people claiming to be born-again Christians, who have a very...confined idea of what it means to be "saved." Typically, they speak of their salvation in three ways:

1.) Rescued from hell.
2.) Cleansed of the stain of sin.
3.) Related to God as His child.

While all of these things are definitely features of being a "saved" person, they all are oriented on the character of the first step that one takes toward God in trusting in Christ as one's Savior and submitting to him as one's Lord. But that first step of faith into God's kingdom and family is just that: The first step. Beyond that step is an entire journey into life with God. Too many times, in my experience anyway, believers take that first step through the "Door" who is Jesus Christ onto the "Narrow Way" that leads toward God and then stop, moving no further along the "Narrow Way." The writer of Hebrews addressed this sort of believer:

Hebrews 5:12-13
12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food,
13 for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child.

Here, certain believers were remaining perennially childish in their faith, able only to take in spiritual "milk" rather than "meat." What did this look like, exactly?

Hebrews 6:1-2
1 Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,
2 and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.

These childish, immature, believers were "laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and faith toward God." Repentance and faith are elements necessary to being saved, but they are not to be laid again and again in the saved person's life. The Christian life isn't to be a constant cycle of repenting from dead works (ie. Sin), then doing "dead works," then repenting of them again, over and over. People who live like this tend to remain very uncertain in their faith, their sin cutting them off from enjoying daily fellowship with God. Though they can never dissolve their adoption into His family, this spiritually-immature child of God, because of their sin, is in constant doubt about the reality of their membership in God's family and kingdom. They get caught up, as a result, in external things - rituals of purification, miraculous healing, eschatology and the wrath of God upon the wicked - never being transformed in their "inner person" by God.

A big part of the problem with these believers, often, is that they have a too-limited understanding of what it means to be saved. There is more to the matter of being redeemed by God than rescue, cleansing and relationship. There is also:

1.) Regeneration.
2.) Conformity to Christ.
3.) Fellowship with God.

Yes, God has rescued all of His children from the condemnation and punishment of their rebellion toward Him. But this rescue is not an end in itself. In tandem with rescue, and necessary to it, is spiritual regeneration. There is, in fact, no rescue without spiritual regeneration; if one is not regenerated spiritually, they are not rescued. What is meant by "spiritual regeneration"? Both Jesus and the apostle Paul have offered explanations:

John 3:3-7
3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’

Ephesians 2:4-5
4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

Titus 3:5-6
5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior,

Perhaps you've heard the adage, "Born once, die twice; born twice, die once." In this pithy statement is encapsulated the idea of spiritual regeneration. Salvation imparts new spiritual life; the person who is born a second time spiritually is "made alive" spiritually by the Holy Spirit. By his making of the lost person his "temple" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20), his dwelling place, he gives to them his life, the life of Christ, in fact, "washing and renewing" them and fundamentally, permanently altering them.

2 Corinthians 5:17
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

Romans 8:9-11
9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

Are you living in the light, not just of your rescue from God's wrath upon your sin, but of your "new creature" status, a "temple" of the Holy Spirit? Here's part of what it means to be the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit and given new spiritual life by him:

1 Corinthians 6:17-20
17 But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.
18 Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.
19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own,
20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

Colossians 3:1-5
1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.
3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

Continued below.

 

[Tenchi]

Along with being rescued and regenerated spiritually, the saved person is also cleansed of the stain of their sin. But that cleansing is for the purpose of being more and more "conformed to the image of Jesus Christ."

Romans 8:28-29
28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
The "good" that God is working out in all things is that you and I might be "conformed to the image of His Son." In everything, God will work toward this exceedingly good end. We aren't merely cleaned up by being saved, then, but set on a course of change by God whereby we become increasingly like Jesus. Is this your experience? Is this sort of change a constant in your life? Perhaps you've "fossilized" into thinking that salvation is just about rescue and cleansing, not new being a "new creature" whom God intends should manifest Jesus Christ in ever-fuller degree. This wasn't the apostle Paul's attitude:

2 Corinthians 4:6-11
6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
8 We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;
9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;
10 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
11 For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

Paul understood that in everything - even terrible suffering - God wanted to manifest His Son in Paul's character and life. How about you? Are you thinking that you've been rescued and cleansed and will go to heaven, by and by, and that, 'til then, you should just carry on being as nice a person as you can be? Is your view of being a Christian that God wants to improve you, to make you the best version of yourself that's possible? This is NOT the life for which anyone has been saved. God intends that those He saves should be living sacrifices to His will (Romans 12:1), vessels in whom and through whom the Person of Jesus Christ is manifested more and more. This is the normal Christian life.

Finally, being saved is the means whereby a lost person enters into relationship with God; however, the child to Father relationship obtained by being saved is formed in order that fellowship may result. What's the difference between relationship and fellowship? Well, the parable of the Prodigal Son brings the difference to the fore (Luke 15:11-32). While the Prodigal was off in a "far country" wasting his inheritance, he did not talk with his father, or eat with him, or touch him. They did not look upon each other, the father and son, or laugh together, or enjoy any sort of interaction. It was as if the son was dead, in fact, so total was the loss of fellowship during the son's sinful wandering.

But when, in repentance and humility, the son returned to his father, immediately fellowship resumed: The father embraced his boy, kissed him on the cheek, clothed him in new robes and threw a welcome-home party for him. Though always in relationship to one another as father and son no matter how the son behaved and no matter the distance between them, only when the son drew near to his father could they enjoy direct, personal, positive interaction with one another.

In His word, God is very clear that He is not intending to adopt us as His own and then remain at a distance from us, our interactions with Him institutional and academic, mediated always by priests or pastors, confined by the dictates of human religious hierarchies and institutions and constrained solely to the revelation of God in Christian doctrine and ritual. No, God brings us into relationship with Himself through Jesus so that we might enjoy intimate communion - fellowship - with Himself.

2 Corinthians 13:14
14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

1 John 1:3
3 ...our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.
Revelation 3:20
20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

John 15:15
15 No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.

Romans 8:15
15 For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, "Abba! Father!"

2 Peter 1:2-4
2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord;
3 seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.
4 For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.
Are you content merely to be related to God as His child, never enjoying fellowship with Him, never calling him "Abba! Father!" but standing always at a distance from, expecting nothing more as His child than intersecting with Him through doctrine, ritual and religious hierarchy? Such an expectation is not at all what the normal Christian life is supposed to be!

There is rescue, yes, but also regeneration in being saved.

There is cleansing, yes, but also conformity to Christ in being saved.

There is relationship to God, yes, but also fellowship with Him in being saved.

Have you been living in the truth of all that being saved means?

 

[Christ_empowered]

This very helpful. I remember reading a book about Protestant doctrine and the author writes that Jesus Christ saves us from: sin Satan self death and the world.

After actually getting truly saved myself this is constantly brought to my mind…